The price
by Shivvy
Summary: They say that everyone can be bought for a cost, but how much would it take for you? Have you ever considered the price of your soul? A fairly dark look into Seras’ fight against temptation and the descent into madness.


Disclaimer: I don't own Hellsing, only the Police girl's inane ramblings.

A.N: I don't know if you really wanna call this "angst", its more like the late night ponderings we all do when we can't quite seem to get to sleep. My first real attempt at something of this sort, so constructive criticism is loved.

Rating: Perhaps a little dark, so I'll call it pg-13.

Pairing(s): None..._really. _But hints of something or the other.

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The moon was full that night, the night that my heart stopped beating. I remember it growing cold as each beat leaked more of my precious life-blood out onto the ground around me; the sick feeling of air sucking through the gaping hole in my lung as I struggled to keep conscious. Each breath like the grains of sand running out, tinking away the last moments of my existence. Sometimes to this day I swear I can feel the blood still seeping into my right lung, like the phantom pang of a limb no longer there.

Weak and dizzy from blood loss and shock, and one foot in the grave, how could I say no to his offer? Battered and broken on the floor of an old chapel; is this how it really all started? On clear crisp nights when I look up at that same moon, and feel the constant thrum of the night in my bones I wonder if I always reveled in the darkness like this?

I wonder if every decision I made as a human was always so heavily weighted. Was the beast always inside of me, waiting to shred my sanity and leap out at the first chance? Sometimes that is what it feels like, when I wake up with the night's song singing in my veins. Wasn't it always like this? It's hard to remember some days.

When I was a child, playing in the sun with two loving parents watching over me, had the darkness still been planted deep within me?

If I squeeze my eyes real hard, and block out the whispers for long enough, will I learn to control it? Will denying my body and its hungers help me hold onto my humanity any longer?

He wants me to break, I know it. Those dark murmurs in the night that urge me to let go only substantiate what he says. I am no longer human, so why do I cling so tenaciously to the vestiges of humanity? Can't I be what they want and still be a good person, or was I ever one to begin with?

Once you have killed, can you ever go back? As much as I try to be, I am not the model of righteousness one would think. As much as I try, the blood of your first kill never washes off.

In the heat of the moment, it's so easy to just pull the trigger. There is no time to ponder on the life you are about to take. If there's one thing being a cop has told me, it's hesitation will get you killed. But late in the night nothing can stop the questions from coming. Did this man have a family and parents who loved him?

Endless dreams and aspirations can so easily be snuffed out with the snick of the trigger and a few ounces of metal alloy. But these things are never on your mind at that time. I still remember the crunching of bone and the fetid stench of gunpowder and fresh blood as the bullet ripped into his soft flesh. The sick fascination of watching the life seeping out of his body in an instant, becoming nothing but a hollow shell; the heady feel of my heart pumping fast and the adrenaline roaring in my body.

Even as humans we can't help but revel in the kill. The power of taking a life is as incredible and awe inspiring as it is sickening. I still remember the weakness that overtook me afterwards. My head spinning as I dropped to the pavement and emptied my stomach's contents onto it, the unmistakable surge of satisfaction still fresh in my mind. My teammates had consoled me, saying it was a natural reaction to the first time. My first kill. I wondered then if there would be others, but never would I have imagined the providence that lay before me.

An endless undeath sits before me with more killing than most mortals could imagine. No matter what they are, vampires, Freak trash, or "bad guys" as my first kill had been, they were still a life to be taken. No matter how hard I try, the blood will never wash off, and the kill will never cease to make my blood burn brighter.

It is in our nature. The beast has always been there I see now, and no amount of blood will ever slake its hunger. All the way back to original sin and the murder of Abel, that primordial cry for violence and destruction is just as ingrained in our humanity as the air we breathe. Or in my case, the air I don't breathe.

But how long can I hold out against it I ask myself... Would it save my immortal soul if I died tonight, never giving in to the madness that threatens to consume me? As one of the undead am I not already damned?

_'Blessed are those who hunger and thirst for righteousness, for they shall be satisfied.'_

We are all just naked children, scared and screaming in the dark. If I become what he wants of me, will I find the truth of who I am, or will I sink into the madness that consumes him?

Sometimes I wonder if someone couldn't call him back; but then I realize, call him back from what? More than likely he is as he always was. The beast ragged in him before just like all of us, and no "love" or kindness would ever cleanse the tarnish on his soul. He has never fought against the darkness that is in us all, and perhaps that is what makes him great.

Perhaps if I could be more like her, master of my Master. Surrounded in the torrent of darkness that is her duty. Death is in her blood more than anyone else's, but still she holds out against the temptation. Strength and power, but still she retains her humanity. If I could be like her, would it satisfy him?

The whispers inside tell me he will never embrace me until I have become like him. Secretly perhaps we both want the same thing, but will giving into the spiral of madness quiet the cries?

Perhaps I would rather stop fighting if it meant I wouldn't be alone in this endless night. I won't deny he excites and fascinates me; the same way a wreck on the interstate draws ones gaze and holds it no matter how hard you try to look away. The same feeling that makes my blood sing, and leaves me gasping for air - sick and trembling on the pavement again.

'_All these things I will give to you, if you fall down and worship me.'_

He is the ultimate temptation and the guiltiest pleasure. But is this excitement worth the price of my soul? Is he?

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Well there you go one thousand words of introspective drivel born of too much caffeine at three in the morning. This is about the darkest I get, but who knows what I could squeeze out on an even BIGGER caffeine high! Reviews, requests, story trades and challenges always loved.


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